TOKYO (REUTERS) - Apple Inc raised prices of iPads and iPods in Japan on Friday, becoming the highest-profile brand to join a growing list of foreign firms asking Japanese consumers to pay more as a weakening yen squeezes profit. Some United States (US) companies have inoculated themselves at least temporarily against the yen's fall through financial hedging instruments, while others are charging customers more. The yen has fallen more than 20 per cent against the US dollar since mid-November when then-opposition leader Shinzo Abe, who is now prime minister, prescribed a dose of radical monetary easing to reverse years of sliding consumer prices as part of a deflation-fighting policy, dubbed "Abenomics." The Bank of Japan, under a new Abe-backed governor, in April promised to inject US$1.4 trillion (S$1.77 trillion) into the economy in less than two years to achieve 2 per ...